Our family's adventures in cooking,
crafting, and enjoying each other.

Monday, October 31, 2011

Halloween

When I was a kid, my mom painstakingly stitched all of my Halloween costumes, and I loved them. So it matters to me that the girls have their own little labors of love. My mom always searched through pattern books, finding just the right costume, and spent weekends at the kitchen table with her sewing machine. I don't know how she found the patience, especially when I think about how my favorite thing to do was pick up pins with a magnet, which always ended up with the whole box of pins spewed over the kitchen floor. (Plus if you magnet-ed them enough, they would stick to each other, which I thought was awesome, but I can see now was probably endlessly annoying to my mom. So far, Hannah is forbidden to touch my pins, even though she has a familiar manic gleam in her eye when she spies them.)

I'm trying to get as much mileage out of girly-girl and matching outfits, while neither girl has too much of a say. So my little love bugs dressed as insects this year: Hannah was a butterfly, and Lydia a ladybug. I thought about both girls having wire wings, but finally decided that there was nothing Hannah would like better than to flap her own wings. I was right (wait and see for yourself...). But for Lydia, I fashioned a tiny pair of wings from a coat hanger and half a pair of knee-high stockings.

A tulle tutu finished the look.

Who knew, but the wings double as a super-cool pair of giant sunglasses.

And here are the flappable wings! Ever practical, they're attached to a long sleeve leotard. Also, recognize this tutu from a Halloween past?

Paired with some pink patent boots, she could almost be a new hybrid ballet superhero.

Hannah picked the sequined trim herself. I have to admit, she has good taste. It totally made the outfit. And there was exactly enough left over to make a headband.

On a kid this cute (when she was one, Hannah won a costume contest by sheer force of personality, not because her costume was anything special), you can imagine the candy haul she came home with tonight!